Your CMO is responsible for staying abreast of real-time changes in consumer behavior, the business environment, social norms and new technology. We are living in an age of disruption that is only multiplied in niche industries such as building materials. Every direction is a new disruption, yes, but all of the changes are also opportunities for the right marketer.
Here are a few of the ways that your CMO can handle the ever expanding environment of disruption and come out on top for your business.
Exploring Lightning Fast Advancements in Science and Tech
The number of technologies that have become household concepts over the past five years has accelerated exponentially over the past five years. Consider AI, facial recognition software, virtual reality, robotics and the Internet of Things – there are many places that your CMO can put the marketing budget and human capital. All of these technologies should not be cultivated for their own sake. Marketers should look to tame these disruptive concepts for the sole purpose of understanding the motivations of customers and developing solutions for them.
Connecting Media Platforms
Connected devices and multisensory platforms are completely redefining how we use media and even how we define what media is. The Internet of Things makes household appliances media – media that may even outperform its traditional counterparts. If your fridge can now recommend certain foods to you based on your unique biorhythms and whether you are likely hungry at that stage of the day, we owe it to our businesses to look again at how we may be able to use new technologies to our advantage. The building materials industry will be looking to the Internet of Things especially to connect with prospects.
Considering the Customer Holistically
With the proliferation of big data and the ability to segment and analyze it precisely comes an opportunity to study customers more deeply than ever before. We are living in a consumer-centric world, and this trend is not reversing itself any time soon. In a small industry like building materials, everyone knows everyone else. Each person within a sales funnel must be considered fully as a human being with personal goals and choices in every communication. This could be quite a task without the buyer profiles that modern marketing technology helps put together for us.
New Ways of Doing Business
The new business models that are being created through disruptive technologies are just as disruptive as the tech itself. Process is just as much innovation as any individual piece of technology. Additionally, companies within the building materials industry must consider ideals beyond a simple profit motive. We owe it to ourselves and to our community to look at revenue models with an impact socially as well as financially. Many companies actually find that expanding their bottom lines comes more quickly with an expansion into open source innovation programs and benefit corporations.
A Real Time Response to Changes in Society
Changes in society mean changes in the motivations of future employees and the perception of actions that a business takes. For instance, certain manufacturing processes that would have been industry standard within building materials might now be considered anti-environment and cause enough of a stir to hinder business, yes, even B2B transactions. The CMO must ensure the public facing image of the business is intact, even if that campaign is only to keep the company out of the general news cycle.
As disruptive technologies create more opportunities, CMOs throughout the industry will need to decide how to best employ these new tools. Directing the new features to any hang-ups in the segmentations above is a good start in navigating the ever-changing world of building materials and using new tech in a positive way.
